Goodbye and Hello
by Moondreamer
Summary: Grizabella tells the story of CATS through her eyes. Watch out, this is deep thought.


Wreckage. That's what I look like now. A shadow of what I used to be. All that's left of my beauty is my beauty mark. I've torn the mask of grace away, and revealed a face more frightening that the Phantom of the Opera's. As I sit and cry softly, I feel someone walking up to me. It is a large cat, so like a miniature lioness, yet stronger and sleeker than any lioness of this world. "Have faith," she whispers. Fog wraps around her as she smiles. "Faith." The fog envelops her and she is gone.  
I feel hope strike into my heart. Perhaps there is hope for me after all? There's only one way to find out.  
I hobble back to the Junkyard. It's the night of the Jellicle Ball, the night the Jellicle choice is made. As I come closer, I hear Munkustrap say in his solemn voice, "Who will it be?" As the others repeat after him, I silently ask, *Will it be me?*  
I am ready to ascend. The others are not. Not even Gus. If only they would let me! Where is the kind-heartednes I hear so much of? My idol, Jennyanydots, keeps the kittens from touching me; my friend, Jellylorum, stares at me insolently; even my sister, for Bast's sake, is furious with me. Just because her fur is red doesn't mean she's any better than me.  
Only the sweetest and most naive will try to touch me; Jemima, who finds me fascinating, Etcetera, who thinks me almost as curious as Tugger, and Demeter, who sees herself in me. We've both seen the wrong side of the tracks-she fears me because she sees what could have happened to her.  
Munkustrap thinks me a highly dangerous lunatic. He always was a strange one. I try to make him see that I am simply a rundown Bombalurina; he shuts his eyes to the truth. I appeal to Jellylorum, but she drags the kittens away from me.  
Then Demeter sings of what she knows of my life. Haunting Tottenham, living where I was not welcome, day in and day out. Of the people wondering why I wasn't dead. Of who I used to be and who I was now. She was scornful, but not bitingly so, as the others had been.  
I leave, letting them play at their silly games, and return much later in the night. Then, I sing my song of my life these years, and hide by the car to see who understands. I've gotten through to Jemima, Old Deutoronomy, Coricopat, and Tantomlie. Progress, but not much. I bide my time.  
As the first rays of sunlight appear, I return, one last time. I watch them shun me, turn their faces from me. I sing to them the song Jemima sang, with but a single change-I sing "Memory" instead of "Moonlight," for the song is but a memory. A fast-fading one, like my glamour days. I sing with what little power I have, but none turn to look at the former queen of style.  
The hope dies. I lie down where I am and hope to be killed gently.  
And hear a single voice, a supporting friend, a hope-giver. Jemima. Instinctively, I know what she will sing, and I sing with her, hope filling me until I am strong once more.  
"Touch me! It's so easy to leave me all alone with the memory..." I sing from the heart, hoping to melt their own icy hearts.  
An omen shows itself to me. "Look-a new day has begun."   
I was wrong. No one has any compassion for a foolish queen like me. I begin hobbling off, but suddenly stop. Someone's heart was touched.  
I lean forward, with one paw behind me. Another paw touches mine. Victoria's soft, silky paws, I know at once. I smile.  
A new day has indeed begun.  
I am led to a line of cats, including the formerly icy-hearted tom Munkustrap. At the end of the line is Old Deutoronomy. He takes my paws and leads me up onto the tire, and calls to the Heavyside Lair. A staircase descends from the sky.   
I stare at Old Deutoronomy. Surely he would choose someone else to go to the lair this year, not me? No, he nods to me and I take a tentative step towards the staircase. Then another.  
Before long, I'm at the top of the stairs, and I look down to a world that gave me beauty and wrenched it away, that was unforgiving and unforgetting, a world I loved for its passion, its power, its soul.  
I shall return, and I will live a renewed life.  
Goodbye and hello. 


End file.
